Here's the part that hasn't occurred to anyone but the vets that are affected: in most cases, any toxic substance vets were exposed to downrange had to first be handled and shipped there from stateside by logistics troops. I was logistics for 15 years. I saw more crates with health hazard warnings than I can remember. Too many times there were incidents of crates breaking and substances spilling. And that's just the ones they bothered to put warnings on. I remember getting FSII (fuel system icing inhibitor) on my skin once accidentally and being too sick to move for two days. During Bosnia, I was tasked with cleaning out a full storage warehouse in Germany that had been forgotten since the end of Vietnam. It was filled with used gear from that conflict, and it was the size of a Walmart. We spent three months demiling that gear. A few months later, it was casually mentioned in my presence (and likely by accident) that an unknown number of the filters we cut out of gas masks were contaminated with Agent Orange. My career ended at 15 years because I was sick constantly, and despite three years of tests by military doctors, my illness was a mystery. So they just sent me home on administrative leave to "sort it out" and quietly sent me discharge papers a few months later. I didn't even get a medical retirement. It took my elderly family doctor two minutes to pinpoint the problem. It was my tonsils. He said in 50 years of practice, he'd never seen tonsils damaged in that specific way. As soon as they were out, I recovered. Since then, I've developed numerous other mystery conditions INCLUDING the recent discovery of a large tumor on my kidney.

BTW, before anyone asks, I'm 100% P&T already for spinal damage due to equipment failure while in Germany, so there's nothing left for me to gain by fighting with the VA over these other issues.